Terrorism and its impact on Security in the region

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 By: Faisal Fulad- @faisalfulad1956

Political and security tension between the Arabs States, mainly the Arabian Gulf Nations and Iran has caused to spread violence throughout the region. The majority of the Arabian Gulf Nations pointed out that Iran supports terrorism in some Arab nations such as Bahrain, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen.

In fact, there is a fear of controlling oil, gas and other natural resources by extremist and terrorist groups, in which terrorism has affected the vast majority of the Arab States, such as geopolitics, political economy, energy, diplomacy and international security in the region that can be important issues to raise bell over terrorism and security in the region.

Hence, the Iranian policies to affect security in the region through supporting the militia groups such as Hezbollah in Lebanon and Al-Houthi in Yemen caused Saudi Arabia led Arab Coalition in Yemen to support the legitimate government headed by Mr Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi, the current president of Yemen in March 2015.  Saudi Arabia and Yemen both stated that Iran is behind the fall of the government in Sanaa through supporting Al-Houthi group in Yemen.

The Iranian movements in the region through supporting terrorist groups such as Hezbollah and Al-Houthi and other militias have caused to increase poverty and homelessness, inflation, political clash, insecurity and Enforced disappearance, terror the oppositions, and child soldiers; in which all these issues are violation of international law and human rights, and international humanitarian law.

Background of Iran movements

Iran has been targeting the Gulf Nations since the Islamic Republic took power in Iran in 1979 through extremist groups such as Hezbollah. For instance, CIA in 1986 stated that “Iran uses international terrorism to achieve specific foreign policy objectives’’. Therefore, it is not surprising to say that Iran still targets the Gulf Nations through Hezbollah despite Iran was under political and economic sanction until the nuclear deal in 2014 and 2015 with International Community.

According to the US Secretary of State in 2014, the state-sponsored terrorism will certainly face sanctions, such as “the ban on arms exports and sales; a ban on economic assistance; financial ban and other restrictions”. Therefore, some countries, such as Iran, continued their terrorism-related activity in 2014, although Iran has a political consensus on the nuclear program, including supporting Hezbollah and various groups in Iraq and throughout the Middle East, such as Yemen’s extremist groups “Al-Houthi”.

The US Secretary of State noted that Iran has increased its assistance to Iraqi Shia militias under the pretext of fighting I.S.I.S (Daesh), and has continued to support other militia groups in the region. Iran also attempted to smuggle weapons to some groups in the region, particularly in Syria, Yemen and other parts of the region. Iran uses the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force (IRGC-QF) to target security of the Arabian Gulf Nations through providing intelligence operations and modern weapons to the militia.

The US Security of State also added that Iran continued to provide arms, financing, training, and the facilitation of primarily Iraqi Shia and Afghan fighters to support the Syrian regime that has caused of the death of a large number of Syrian civilians. For instance, the UN in February 2018 claimed that at least 246,000 people were killed, but the Syrian Human Rights groups believe that over 420,000 people have killed in Syria since 2011.

“Likewise in Iraq, despite its pledge to support Iraq’s stabilisation, Iran increased training and funding to Iraqi Shia militia groups in order to destroy the political structure in Iraq”. Many of these groups, such as Kata’ib Hezbollah (KH) and Filag Badr, have exacerbated sectarian tensions in Iraq and have violated of human rights against Sunni civilians and other people who are against the Iranian intervention in Iraq. Iran provides training and sophisticated technology such as modern weapons to Iraqi Shia militia groups to weaken Iraqi army and increase instability in the country.

In another case of instability and insecurity in the region, the Bahraini government stated that Iran supports extremist groups in the Kingdom, so Bahrain has continued to increase its efforts to detect, neutralise and contain terrorist threats in 2014. The Government of Bahrain has also begun to implement a tougher counterterrorism law that was approved by the legislature during the first half of the year. For example, the Ministry of Interior added that the Bahraini government would punish those who are active with “Daesh” in Iraq and Syria. The Government of Bahrain also supports peace and security in the world, such as hosting an international conference on I.S.I.S on 9 November 2014. Therefore, the Bahraini Government welcomed UN Security Council Resolutions 2170 and 2178 on peace and security in the region.

The government of Bahrain has mentioned the list of terrorist movements in Bahrain that have caused the death of civilians and police officers. For instance, the death of three policemen on 15 February 2014 after a homemade bomb detonated in Al-Dair, the death of two local police officers and one officer from the UAE on 3rd March 2014 through bomb exploded in al-Daih, one police officer was killed on 4 July 2014 by a homemade bomb detonated in East Eker, the terrorism was targeted a police officer on 9th December 2014 by a homemade bomb exploded in Dumistan, and also one civilian was killed by a homemade bomb that exploded in Karzakan on 10th December 2015.

Thus, due to the actions of the Iranian regime in 2014 and other previous decades, the US State Department said in its report in 2015 that “Iran is the main sponsor of terrorism in the world by financing and equipping various armed groups, such as Hezbollah, as well as other armed groups in Bahrain, Iraq and Yemen; and Iran continued to use the Quds Force for its Revolutionary Guards to create chaos throughout the Middle East.

Iran affects security

After 1991, Iraq began to weaken due to its policy towards Kuwait, but Iran seized the opportunity and increased its influences to target Iraqi state and other Arabian Gulf Nations through militia networks. Therefore, the U.S.-led war in 2003 to invade Iraq and remove Saddam Hussein from power created an opening for Iran to expand its regional influence.

In fact, since the 1979 Islamic revolution, Iran has targeted Iraq, the Gulf Nations, and its own oppositions who were stayed in the region, and targeted the USA. For instance, Iran bombed the US embassy and Marine barracks in 1983 in Lebanon through its Militia (Hezbollah) that was caused the death of 17 officials and 241 Marines.

The Iranian regime also supports the policy of chaos in the region through supporting the Houthis in all types of weapons, which include shipments of light, medium and powerful weapons such as missiles that violate the rights of Yemeni citizens because of increasing killing and slaughter by the Houthis. For example, there are 7 million mines in Yemen that are working with Iranian battery; two-thirds of the Houthi fighters are children under the age of 18, and about 1,000 women have been raped in Yemen by Houthi. Thus, the Saudi intervention stopped the Iranian tide from targeting Yemen and other countries neighbouring Yemen, especially the weakness of Houthi forces along the Red Sea coast of Yemen, and isolating the Houthi forces in north-western Yemen by supporting legitimate forces to regain control of the country.

Washington has imposed new sanctions on Iran and called for an emergency meeting by the Security Council. For example, the USA has imposed sanctions on five Iranian companies accused of participating in Iran’s ballistic missile that Iran run it in the secret bases.

Iran also violates its citizens with the most severe violations, such as executions, torture, life in imprisonment, and others charges. For example, the Iranian regime killed a considerable number of protestors in the last protest in Iran from 28th December 2017 to 6th January 2018, in which the Iranian protests were caused the US Ambassador to the United Nations Nicky Haley warned before the meeting that the protests in Iran could turn into a conflict similar to what happened in Syria.

Amnesty International urged Iran to release all detainees held in the protests. The organisation confirmed that at least 5,000 people had been arrested in the protests and were threatened with torture to extract confessions in security cells and riot police in Iran.

Therefore, the Bahrain Human Rights Watch Society called for ending Iranian interventions in the region which has been causing the deaths of a large number of innocent people in the region, the society also urged for the need to protect all detainees from torture and other ill-treatment by the Iranian regime and its militias. The society also urged Iranian authorities to release all Iranian detainees who were arrested in the last protest in Iran.

It means that “Iran is a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights – which means that the Iranian authorities must uphold the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and freedom of expression. Therefore, Iran should release all detainees detained in protests from Iranian prisons”.

Faisal Fulad

Secretary-General

Bahrain Human Rights Watch Society

0097336633882

00447470321733

rightswatchsociety@gmail.com

Bahrain Human Rights Watch Society

The Bahrain Human Rights Watch society provides projects focusing on militia activities in the region which caused instability of the region, and the instability has an impact on the human rights of Arab citizens. The society focuses on all human rights violations by the Iranian authorities and its non-state actors in the region against all the peoples of the region, which include people of Bahrain- Yemen- Iranian and others.

I am an international Human Rights Activist and I was a member of Kingdom of Bahrain’s upper chamber of parliament, the Consultative Council, from 1996 to 2010.

I am a Union activist since 1975 and founder of the General Federation of Bahraini Workers, I was the head of the General Committee for Bahrain Workers from 1996 to 1998 and chairman of the Labour joint committee for Gulf Air from 1996 to 2001, and a founder the Bahrain Human Rights Watch Society (BHRWS) and Global group, The Gulf European Centre for Human Rights (GECHR), where I stand as Secretary-General.

My vocal advocacy includes issues such as women’s rights, the formal scrapping of the death penalty and labour rights for national and migrant workers, and terrorism and non-state actors on human being in the Middle East and North Africa.

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